By Linda Bergren Polich. As genealogists, we not only gather the names and dates of our ancestors, but also the places where they lived. Trying to “bring our ancestors to life” requires us to know about those places … the history of the town or village, county line changes, and land records all help us learn more about our ancestors.
We need to learn about the places where life events happened. The more research we do, the more information we keep in folders, binders, or even desk drawers! And we need a way to keep all this information available to us as we continue our research.
We discussed creating a Research Guide in one of our recent Lunch and Learn programs, and the information is worth repeating!
A Research Guide is a three-ring binder that contains dividers for each place our ancestors lived. This guide could include maps, land records, local history … anything that would help us learn more about specific places in their lives.
Here is one way to put together a Research Guide. First, you need a list of all the places in your genealogy software data file. You can do this easily with RootsMagic by clicking on Report >> Print a Report >> Place List. This shows you every entry in your file, by place name, and includes names and events that happened in each place.
Next, create divider tabs for each location in your Place List.
Behind each divider, you can include pages for General Information, Local History and even Maps that may help me with my research. You might also want to keep a listing of the names of persons in your family tree who live in each location.
If you have people from different areas of a particular state, you may want sub-dividers by county or even town/city.
You may also want to add local industries where your ancestors may have worked. For example, under United States >> Illinois >> Rock Island County >> Moline, you could include information about John Deere and other local industries in various time frames.
Additional information that may be helpful in your Research Guide is a language guideline (e.g., what are the translations for common genealogy terms such birth, marriage, death) for foreign countries, and websites specific to certain areas.
There is no right or wrong way to create a Research Guide. Customize this guide to better help you with your research – make it work for you. This would be a handy tool to take along to a library where you are researching.
Happy Researching!
